Spain isnt cheap

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firsttango
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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby firsttango » Thu Oct 05, 2017 2:24 pm

Interesting fun comparison website, not sure how accurate to the nearest penny though, but as a general benchmark worth a look.

https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/comparison.jsp

Free at Last
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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby Free at Last » Thu Oct 05, 2017 2:53 pm

Miro wrote: If you find £115 reasonable for a meal out, there are plenty of posh restaurants in Spain that will happily relieve you of that kind of cash, especially in the bigger cities (including Málaga), so it's really just a case of personal choice, and not a fair indicator of relative cost of living.
Yes, there are certainly more expensive options available than the ones we mere mortals tend to use - a couple of weeks ago we were reading the tasting menu at a Michelin starred restaurant in the Muelle Uno development in Málaga -€140 per head, no drinks included. No doubt their patrons find that reasonable, but I wouldn't especially when it's a case of having to eat whatever the chef has decided to serve up rather than being able to choose from an á la carte menu.

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby Free at Last » Thu Oct 05, 2017 3:01 pm

Miro wrote: We go swimming at the local municipal pool every Friday at noon, when they do a "pound swim": an hour of lengths, roughly 1.5kms, for a £1 each, and we walk there and back, about 35 minutes each way - so that takes care of the "gym" part. Could've joined the local Fitness Club for £45 per month for two, but that makes no sense to me. Smaller pool, shorter walk & probably lots of people who go straight from there for a £115 meal where all the other beautiful people go :lol:

I had a great pint of Mole Catcher real ale, and Mrs.M had a distinctly average frothy coffee/caffe latte/call-it-what-you-will, just a cup of coffee, at the fabulous Philharmonic Dining Rooms yesterday (I'm sure Gordon knows it, but for those who don't, it's just a traditional British pub really); cost an eye-watering £6.25. But the Turkish coffee I had last night I would have gladly paid £115 (not really) - I haven't had such a wonderful cup of coffee since, err...since I was last in Turkey, actually. Impossible to find in Spain, unless anyone else knows otherwise? Other than that, our new "local" cafe sells a decent cuppa for a quid, and we get to keep up our Spanish with the Mexican assistant. :thumbup: All things are possible if you search hard enough!
That's a good deal provided you can actually do an hour of lengths. We have a really nice public pool here in Vélez but it is just too popular for my liking and I can't be doing with people getting in the way when I'm doing laps. I've tried the public pool in my former home town in the UK when i've been back visiting family, but again it is always too full (seems to be very popular with pensioners who don't actually do much swimming but stand bobbing about and chatting in groups :) ). I go to my gym during siesta hours here and almost always I am the only person using the pool at that time which is just great.

I have been to the Philharmonic and it is lovely, I hope they have still preserved the high Victorian interior? There is a lot of great architecture in Liverpool, I hear they have improved the city centre a lot as well since I left the UK. Some places seem to have really gone downhill and others like Liverpool are much better than they used to be.

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby Miro » Thu Oct 05, 2017 4:37 pm

Yes, we can get our laps in, because they rope off two lanes just for that. The oldies stand around bobbing and chatting in the other part of the pool - but there aren't many of them to be honest. Suits us perfectly.
The Philharmonic is still just as it always was - the men's toilets are spectacular! Liverpool really is a fabulous city. I think it's come a long way since becoming European City of Culture a few years ago - very different from when I first visited Mrs.M many years ago, and was scared ****less - of Mrs.M, as well as the wider populace :lol:
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anyroads
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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby anyroads » Sat Oct 07, 2017 5:18 pm

Drank lager "half a litre", ok was probably a pint glass, for 1.50 eur earlier in the week in Spain.

My local here in Hampshire, last night £4.30.

anyroads

markwilding
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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby markwilding » Sun Oct 08, 2017 4:21 pm

From time to time we have this debate on the forum and it never ends conclusively.
My own opinion is that overall and taking everything into a account, it’s probably cheaper in Spain than in the UK.

Having said that, Spanish people often tell me how expensive it is travelling to London However, the amount I I pay differs enormously from what many of them pay.

I always book well in advance, the next three trips are already set up. A weekend for January has cost me 55 euros for the flight, 85 pounds for a two night stay in the Liverpool Street Travelodge, chosen for its price and including a discount offer they sent me via email, effectively costing around 105 Euros per person for fight and stay. I hear of people paying in excess of 375 euros

I rarely get the chance to have a full English breakfast but I will definately pop into a Weatherspoons one of the two mornings.
£ 4.99 is good value in anyones book.

Obviously, for tourist the exchange rate has to be factored in so Spain will appear more expensive than a few years ago for people who don’t live here permanently.

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby anyroads » Wed Oct 11, 2017 12:23 pm

Free at Last wrote: I hear they have improved the city centre a lot as well since I left the UK.
There may be a connection...

Reminds me of the slogan I once saw on a tee shirt.

"Keep Australia tidy. Don't go back"

anyroads

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby Paulinmalaga » Wed Oct 11, 2017 9:09 pm

markwilding wrote: effectively costing around 105 Euros per person for fight and stay. I hear of people paying in excess of 375 euros
Surely living in your part of Spain and all whats currently going on you don't need to travel all the way to London for a "Fight" :lol:
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markwilding
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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby markwilding » Thu Oct 12, 2017 3:13 am

True, I could pick up a Spanish football shirt and walk around the old part of Bilbao wearing it. I'm sure it wouldn't take long before someone picks one with me. :lolno:

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby oliveview01 » Thu Oct 12, 2017 10:24 pm

We had 2 coffees, supposed to be cappuccino, but were more like a plain milky coffee and 2 toasted ( burnt) teacakes cost just under £9 :thumbdown:
Breakfast at the venta, for 3, 1 whole and 2 half rolls, and 3 coffees 4,80€ that includes pate, jam, olive oil and fresh tomato. :thumbup:

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spanish_lad
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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby spanish_lad » Thu Oct 12, 2017 11:37 pm

I suppose it would be nice to be able to contribute to this thread, but I grew up here - I was 17 when I moved here, and I've been here more than 17 years.

The only things that seem cheaper when I visit the uk is Tesco 'value' food, and things like Sainsbury's 1 pound veg bags?
Alhaurin el Grande since 99, working at the airport since 2011.

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby markwilding » Fri Oct 13, 2017 1:30 am

Chocolate is cheaper in the UK but petrol is more expensive in the UK and the cost of public transport is crazy in London compared to here

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby Manchesteral » Wed Oct 18, 2017 10:25 am

Free at Last wrote:
Miro wrote: If you find £115 reasonable for a meal out, there are plenty of posh restaurants in Spain that will happily relieve you of that kind of cash, especially in the bigger cities (including Málaga), so it's really just a case of personal choice, and not a fair indicator of relative cost of living.
Yes, there are certainly more expensive options available than the ones we mere mortals tend to use - a couple of weeks ago we were reading the tasting menu at a Michelin starred restaurant in the Muelle Uno development in Málaga -€140 per head, no drinks included. No doubt their patrons find that reasonable, but I wouldn't especially when it's a case of having to eat whatever the chef has decided to serve up rather than being able to choose from an á la carte menu.
Last Sunday I took my son his wife and children to the "Axe and cleaver" in Dunham Massey, Cheshire where we ate and drank till our cups ranneth (is that a verb or gobbledegook) over, £68 quid very, very good food and service, and it's a chef and brewer !! I guess you can find huge differences in prices in any given area but then, as always i't's down to personal taste !

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby Manchesteral » Wed Oct 18, 2017 12:14 pm

Paulinmalaga wrote:
markwilding wrote: effectively costing around 105 Euros per person for fight and stay. I hear of people paying in excess of 375 euros
Surely living in your part of Spain and all whats currently going on you don't need to travel all the way to London for a "Fight" :lol:
Perhaps Mark has "forgotten" the "out of pocket" expenses 3 very basic meals per day in London for 2 people would be at least £50.00 per day, plus drinks local transport costs, sightseeing etc and all the rest is going to be considerably more than €105.00 per person,

I've just spent 4 nights in Manchester (area) and spent £800.00 !! and that's living in my own gaff, except for one night in a best western which cost me £75.00

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby markwilding » Wed Oct 18, 2017 12:38 pm

My point was that it's possible to avoid unnecessary costs for similar products if you prepare properly. You pay a lot more for the same flight and hotel if you don't book early. I deliberately did not include incidental costs as this depends on individual budgets and many other things. I have a high yearly budget for all things technical so might buy a new laptop, phone or tablet while I'm there.
Last edited by markwilding on Wed Oct 18, 2017 2:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Wicksey
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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby Wicksey » Wed Oct 18, 2017 1:32 pm

On a recent trip back to Kent I had a quick look at Chartwell House as it's somewhere my OH would like to go. It was 13.50 GBP to get in each then they charged another 3 pounds to park, so 30 quid for a visit for the two of us which to me is pretty expensive.

A couple of weeks before that we were in Toledo and the most expensive entry fee we saw was 10€ to the cathedral but most other places were under 5€ a visit. A visit to the castle in Consuegra including one of the 'Quixote' working windmills was 4.50€ each. A few years back in Madrid we found that many places had free entry at certain times of the day so we went to the Palace which we thought was fantastic, free for EU citizens after 5pm. In major cities here we have always found very nice places to eat with good quality local dishes for around 12€ for a menu del dia including a drink. We had a couple of lovely meals in the centre of Toledo but we find 'tourist' towns and cities outside of Spain (not just the UK) have rip-off prices.

We often see interesting places on TV in the UK like Beamish and there's many areas of Britain I have never visited, but it would all add up to quite an expensive trip with accommodation, car hire and entry tickets.

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby markwilding » Wed Oct 18, 2017 2:26 pm

To Balance that out, many museums offer free entry in London and are spectacular compared to some I've visited in other capitals. Prague's Natural history museum was the worst I've been to with long queues to pay 12 euros and then in and out in about 2 hours.

On the other hand, I had to pay to visit the Vatican museum but it was well worth it so value for money should be taken into account as well.

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby Manchesteral » Wed Oct 18, 2017 4:32 pm

Talk about expensive, 10 years ago my son took his fiance to Florence in order to propose romantically, he reported to me that on a rooftop restaurant terrace he paid €12.00 if my memory serves me, for one 33 cl bottle of Peroni, when he questioned the price the waiter told him, yes signor, be careful around here some places will rip you off !!

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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby Manchesteral » Wed Oct 18, 2017 9:01 pm

anyroads wrote:Drank lager "half a litre", ok was probably a pint glass, for 1.50 eur earlier in the week in Spain.

My local here in Hampshire, last night £4.30.

anyroads
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Re: Spain isnt cheap

Postby BENIDORM » Thu Oct 19, 2017 11:10 am

Lots of interesting comments on this thread, and I've come to the conclusion that if you don't have much money, then nowhere is actually cheap but if you are careful you can enjoy a reasonable lifestyle anywhere...( Does that make sense ?) :?
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